Piranha Poodles Top Ten Games of 2009, 4-7

This is the second part of our Top Ten Games of the Year 2009, please see numbers 8-10 and the unlucky ones that missed outhere.

7. Tropico 3

Tropico 3 offers the player the chance to experience life as “el Presidente” of a small Caribbean island. It’s an experience which is remarkably complete. You engage in diplomacy with the USA and USSR; set domestic policies such as social security, contraception bans and martial law; and even micro-manage your island’s daily running down to the placement of every house, wage of every worker and bribing of every faction head on the island.

Tropico 3 is more a remake than a sequel of the original Tropico from 2001, also known as “my favourite game of all time”. Some of this man-love is because of my natural predisposition to anything that simulates politics and political decision making. But is also because unlike other attempts at political games, such as Peter Molyneaux’s Republic: The Revolution, Tropico actually delivered on its campaign promises.

Personally, I’ve never ruled an island of 300 people, but this has to be what it is like. Every citizen has a life of their own, a personality, home, job, family and preferences of which of their constantly depreciating needs (religion, entertainment, sleep etc…) they care about most. Everything, absolutely everything matters. Elections can be hard fought; bribing, denouncing or eliminating problematic faction leaders, making promises you could never keep, and possibly giving a massive tax cut in the final months of the campaign. Or, you can avoid them entirely and declare martial law if the people don’t like it. Assuming the military still like you, of course. In short, it “feels” real. All of this was possible in the original, and still is, and that’s why I love it.

Tropico 3 - amazing attention to detail in both graphics and gameplay.

I was shocked when I heard of the Tropico remake, and doubly nervous when I discovered it was made by a completely different company. But I needn’t have worried. The game has refined the original on every level. While still being a really faithful remake, it looks better, runs better, and has ironed out a veritable fruit stall of little quirks and bugs. An example of this is the introduction of cars to the game which transforms everything for the better. With goods and people moving more rapidly, chains of production are a lot more predictable and entire islands are now open to exploitation, rather than just a small pedestrian-accessible corner. Never has a change of vision and leadership worked so well, viva la revolucion

6. Patapon 2

Patapon 2 epitomises everything that portable gaming should be – enjoyable in short bursts, simple and great looking. I don’t even know why developers bother with 3D games on the PSP with games like Patapon 2 around. Patapon 2 is a crazy-ass catchy hybrid of Real Time Strategy, Rhythm and looting. It’s premise is this; you play a ‘deity’ who leads the patapon (affectionately known as eyes on legs) to battle along a 2D horizontal scrolling battlefield by reciting drum beats that correspond to an action. For example, Pata-Pata-Pata-Pon, denoted by X, Square, Square, Circle instructs your army of Patapon to move forward – with seperate beats corresponding to defends and attack.

The brilliant thing about Patapon has always been that at its most basic level it’s a fun rhythm game that gradually progresses into a genuine strategy title. What starts as an entertaining task of mastering a series of increasingly complex drum beats soon turns into a personal mission to construct the ultimate army of Patapon. This well established strategy-rpg element makes it easy to spend hours and hours playing to the beat of your own drum (no apologies for that pata-pun….).

Nothing if not distinctive.

Patapon 2 doesn’t do a hell of a lot over and above what the original did in terms of graphics and yet was still one of the best looking portable games in 2009. These visuals are something the player is thankful as they settle into the (admittedly now well tuned) grind. Replaying levels is almost essential in Patapon 2 to collect raw materials necessary for crafting new weaponry and evolving new Patapon. Like Phantasy Star Online (or Diablo in Senortubbs speak) before it, the game makes this replaying fun through a compelling random loot system that provides the possibility that an enemy will drop a rare precious metal or weapon.

Patapon 2 doesn’t offer a lot beyond the original, but it certainly gave me enough of a reason to put well over 20 hours into the game. It looks great, it has great tunes and more importantly, its amazingly addictive fun. A standout performer in what has otherwise been a fairly weak year on the portable platforms.

5. inFamous

inFamous’ combination of comic book style, Sly Racoon-esque acrobatics and an incredibly interesting and realised world made it one of Oldgaulians favourites of the year. A particularly solid achievement given it had to compete against similar 3D action-adventure games such as Arkham Asylum, Uncharted 2, Assassin’s Creed 2 and inFamous’ own separated-at-birth twin Prototype.

At its core, inFamous is a tale of good vs evil. A catastrophic explosion has left the three islands of Empire City under the control of different factions and it is up to protagonist Cole to take them back. It’s not a new idea, this is the plot of every GTA ever made (except the good and evil bit), but the story does its job and the conclusion is well worth the effort.

inFamous is two things. Firstly, it is the best Spiderman game on the current generation of consoles. This open-world affair plays out like a super-hero comic with the main protagonist, Cole, as nimble as Spiderman, climbing buildings, jumping from unsurvivable heights and generally traversing the city in what looks like an effortless manner.

Of course it doesn’t have web slinging – but when inFamous allows you to slide along railways and powerlines, who needs it.

This guy has serious issues with static electricity.

Secondly, inFamous is the best StarWars game, period. If LucasArts could make a Star Wars game where being a Jedi (or a Sith, if you’re so inclined) was as nimble, controllable and ultimately as satisfying as controlling the main character is in this game, they would have the greatest licensed game ever created. The game gives the player the ability to wield an array of, frankly, kick-ass lightning skills, and manages to make all of them fun, easy to use, and most importantly amazingly cool. And yet it still manages to give the character a sense of vulnerability. Oh, and did I mention you can be good or evil?

4. Dragonage: Origins

It seems that every year there is room for an 80+ hour sword and sorcery RPG, in 2009 that niche was filled by Bioware’s Dragonage: Origins. Without going into too much detail about the history of Bioware, it is important to say that back in 1998 Bioware released one of the seminal games of this type in Baldur’s Gate, so any attempts to build on that legacy are a very big deal indeed.

Dragonage thrusts the player into the troubled land of Fereldan. Although the actual world itself represents original IP, there is nothing particularly original to be found in any parts of the story. The land is in the grip of a “blight”, a semi-regular invasion of creatures called “darkspawn” that look and behave rather a lot like Tolkeinesque orcs. You’ll become one of the last of an order devoted to stopping them and on the way will complete a set of equally cliché quests such as an Arthurian Grail quest and a heart of darkness chase of a mad dwarf into the mines. Where Dragonage does gain a smattering of originality is in combining these “high fantasy’ ideas with some decidedly “low” plot elements. Xenophobia, rape and general abuse abounds in Fereldan, and just to make sure you know this isn’t actually Tolkien, the elves in Dragonage don’t walk around singing to trees, they’re an underclass living in inner city ghettos.

The bulk of the 90+ hours of Dragonage is spent fighting and exploring alongside your 4-person party. The character skill trees, inventory management and general strategy borrow heavily from the MMORPG genre, so it’s all about finding that set of armour that will help the main tank keep the monsters off the healers. Seemingly also borrowed from MMORPGs is the ongoing side-story/task of keeping your party together. Each character that joins you has a different personality, backstory and opinions on how things should be done. Treat them well, give them gifts and make decisions that they approve of and yours will be a relationship of cheery banter and monster maiming with perhaps a bit of extracurricular “action” on the side. Destroy the last mortal remains of the god that they have devoted their life to worshipping however, and they will instantly attack you and/or leave your party forever.

Dragon Age - you can tell it's mature from all the (near) nudity.

It’s certainly an upgrade to the crappy good-evil based systems that have become so common in recent RPGs, and once I worked out how it worked I enjoyed the pragmatic focus on keeping people happy. The consequences were so severe however and critical decision moments so regular that I found it to really detract from other areas of the game. The constant threat of party members leaving you simply doesn’t work well here. Parties of four are small to start with when you need to cover the tank-dps-heal trifecta, replacements for lost skills are not easily found and many of the combat skills are designed to work symbiotically with those from another class. Watching a development video after completing the game I heard them mention a number of skills and item combinations that “will be enjoyed more by players on their second playthrough” when players know what is coming and how to build around it. Seriously guys, you’ve written a 90+ hour, story driven adventure game. A little more devotion to making sure that the game is more accessible and rewarding while the story is still fresh would have been appreciated.

Overall, a magnum opus like this is the sort of game that belongs at the top of a game of the year list, there is simply more game in here than anything else released in 2009. Read what you will into our decision to put it here at number 4.

So, what will be the top 3? Wait until next time, in the meantime feel free to make your tips in the comments below.